The Queenstown Lakes District Council 2005 survey results for 2005 reflect the continuing pressures that strong growth places on any community, QLDC chief executive Duncan Field said.

"We continue to be the fastest growing district in the country, there is no doubt that growth brings with it uncertainty, which many people struggle to adjust to," Mr Field said.

The Council had now been focused on growth management for four years, with a number of projects now implemented.

"What the survey does tell us is that we need to put more effort into ensuring that the community is better informed on the impact that council strategies will have on our understanding of growth and how we manage it," Mr Field said.

Examples included the Transportation and Parking Study, the Wanaka Structure Plan the High Density Residential Plan Changes, the role of the Urban Design Panels for Wanaka and Queenstown, increased public open space and the development of a network of trails district-wide.

"I am buoyed by the amount of continuing support and positive feedback the survey reflects in terms of the efforts of my staff. In fact, the community's satisfaction with Council services has markedly increased in several areas," Mr Field said.

In other areas the Council was seeing an anticipated levelling off of the high satisfaction levels enjoyed in 2003 and 2004.

The overall satisfaction with the Council dropped from 84 percent last year to 74.5 percent this year.

"The community is understandably feeling some frustration at how long it takes for planning changes and investment in infrastructure to have an impact on growth or to progress a major community project," Mr Field said.

For example in Queenstown car parking and swimming pools continued to be the top two community priorities in the survey.

"Yet both projects are now well in hand with the release this year of the Council?s Future Link Transportation and Parking Strategy and the Queenstown Aquatic Centre now in the consent phase and due to be built next year" Mr Field said.

In addition a new private parking building in Man Street would open early next year and council was now at the detailed design stage of an underground carpark on Stanley Street under the proposed Remarkables Centre and continuing investigations into an underground carpark at the Queenstown Primary School grounds.

The survey also clearly demonstrated the community's growing dissatisfaction in the area of planning and enforcement. Overall satisfaction with the Council's contractor CivicCorp had taken a dive from 69.6 percent last year to 45.7 percent.

An element of that dissatisfaction could be attributed to the pressure of growth but the council had not ignored the same message received in 2004.

"The Council has been working hard to review this contract as a priority. Independent working parties are now well advanced in the service review we implemented earlier this year and we intend to have some answers for the community by year's end. The Council has made a major commitment to improving service delivery," Mr Field said.

The CivicCorp contract review would be followed by independent reviews of all Council contracts.

The Council would have good reason to feel concerned if it was not in a position to demonstrate that in the majority of areas highlighted by the community, implementation was already underway to fulfil the community's priorities.

"I feel confident that in the next 12 months our community will see the uncertainty that is so worrying for it, diminish as the council?s new policies and strategies come into full effect," Mr Field said.

ENDS

For further information please contact Duncan Field 03 441 0499

By: Tamah